President's Message - May 2007

International
Astronomy Day - April 21st - Although the weather didn't cooperate,
Astronomy Day was still a great success here in Victoria! The inside exhibits
at the Royal BC Museum during the day included: Ask an Astronomer booth,
telescope making, Astro kids activities, tour the solar system,
astrophotography. A special feature this year was the live music inspired by the
stars with June Bugg and the Ugly Brothers. Later at the Centre of the
Universe, a special presentation was given: Phoenix - an international
mission to Mars - by Dr. Victoria Hipkin, as well asTelescope
tours and Planetarium shows were held.

Many thanks go to our members who volunteered for this year's
event, as well as our partners: Royal British Columbia Museum, Capital Regional
District Parks, Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, University of Victoria, and
Pearson College of the Pacific.

I wish I could report progress on the building of our new
observatory shed at the old 16" site atop Observatory Hill, but nothing has
happened on this front to date. Victoria Centre has done everything we
can to help the NRC with this building project, however they have made
virtually no progress. On a more positive note, we are still
investigating the acquisition of our new 16" robotic telescope, and at
present we are favoring buying a good robotic-capable equatorial mount with
this year's funds. The funds we received from the BC Gaming Commission
were not adequate to purchase a whole robotic telescope system, but we feel
if we have a good mount, it will serve us well into the future. The
two Vice Presidents and myself are handling this acquisition, so if you have
any feedback or opinions you wish to share, we would be happy to hear from
you.

Our regular meeting will be held May 9th, 7:30pm at UVic.
Russ Robb from UVic will be talking about his favorite subject: extrasolar
planets. Considering the recent news coverage on some exciting new
discoveries, it will be interesting to find out first hand how the science
around these objects is done. Consult the Meeting
Schedule for more information about this talk.

The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada is dedicated
to the promotion of astronomy and its related sciences; we espouse the
scientific method, and support dissemination of discoveries and
theories based on that well-tested method.